News

A whole block of cheese, please: This genius store is selling halloumi fries

Potato chips are pretty much the perfect food. Crispy, carby, and comforting, they’re an excellent vehicle for savoury flavours, spices or sweet sauces. You might think there’s no way, really, to improve on them.

But one Middle Eastern stall at London’s Camden Market may have done just that.

Oli Baba’s, which serves up meat-free Levantine cuisine (that’s food from the area around Syria, Palestine and Jordan), styles itself as the original creator of halloumi fries. Yes, ladies and gents, we’re talking about chips made of fried cheese. (At least they’re low-carb?)

Frying halloumi is not exactly a new invention, though serving it in these portion sizes is a new one for us. Instead of ketchup, or something simple and sensible like lemon juice, they’re served with za’atar yoghurt, pomegranate molasses, mint, sumac, Turkish chilli and pomegranate seeds.

Oli Baba’s also serves healthy, wholesome salads like fattoush (which is helpfully translated as ‘fried bread salad’. Not quite so healthy, then…) and sabich (a loaded pita), but it has made its name, on Instagram at least, for frying vast quantities of cheese.